


biology of the beast

by futureboy (PokeRowan)



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Background Ryan Haywood/Jeremy Dooley, Ghost Drifting, K-Science (Pacific Rim), M/M, Mild Gore, Pacific Rim AU, The Drift (Pacific Rim), Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-03-13 09:27:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13567668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PokeRowan/pseuds/futureboy
Summary: “You’re joking. Right?” he says to Trevor. “I can’t stay in there. That British fuck is gonna drive me to homicide.”Trevor only shrugs.[Pacific Rim!AU. Gavin Free is a man of all sciences. It's a shame he's so goddamn annoying, because Michael might actually believe he was gonna save the world otherwise.]





	biology of the beast

**Author's Note:**

> [RPF disclaimer: Written according to guidelines set by RT employees (to the best of my knowledge). This is a fictional series of events using characters inspired by real people.]

If Free been anyone else, then he’d have been insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Michael’s working for a division that’s trying to save the goddamn world, for fuck’s sake - he’s wrangling technology he’s never ever _seen_ before, they’re losing more people every day they fight, and there’s giant monsters coming up from the asshole of the Mariana Trench. The international team that are transferring over should be a walk in the cocksucking park.

Fuckin’... _scientists_ , though. They’re not people who makes things easy.

The first time the two meet sets the tone for each day that follows. There’s no moment of soul-connection; no moment of mutual exclamation that would lead them down the softer path of friendship.

No, Gavin Free barrels into the lab that Michael’s been allocated to prep, a wide-open and utterly useless lab coat fluttering in his stead, and yells. There’s a similar noise in response from down the corridor.

“D’ya fuckin’ _mind?_ ” asks Michael, already pissed off. “I’m trying to calibrate the siren system--”

“Sorry, mate,” the scientist says. He doesn’t stop grinning. He’s got wild hair and a mess of scruff on his face, and an English accent so sharp that Michael can practically hear corners in the shape of every word.

“UK?” says Michael. He doesn’t care, but he kinda wants to know anyways.

“Yup. Hey, while you’re up there, d’ya reckon you could link us up a stereo system? Lil J and I work best with rap battles going on, so--”

Michael stops.

He descends down the rungs of his ladder, screwdriver between his teeth, until he reaches the floor.

Then he pulls off his insulated gloves and tucks them under his arm.

“You realise people are dying, right?” he asks casually. “Like, I just need you to know that. Tell me you know that.”

The man’s smile falls.

“Of course I know, you sausage. I’m not an _idiot_.”

“Coulda fooled me, lab coat,” Michael bites back, “so if you could leave me to setting up your shitty lab and not doing your best insensitive asshole impression, then I’d really appreciate it, man.”

The scientist saunters back over to the doorway, looking thunderous; it’s a tall room, so as Michael begins to climb his ladder again, all he can catch is a mop of hair and a blur of white fabric in the corner of his eye.

“Hey, Jeremy,” he calls out, pointedly making sure that Michael can overhear, “did you know that we can still be happy and have fun even though things are absolutely _cack_ in the world right now?”

“Yeah,” comes that distant voice again. “Who’s saying otherwise?”

The man throws his hands up. “Who knows!” he says, “we didn’t get to introductions, because he’s a rude knob!”

“Aw, real mature of you, dude,” Michael says, taking the bait and waving over his shoulder with his screwdriver, “I’m Michael Jones, and I’m _actually working_ \--”

“Gavin Free. _Scientist_.”

“You people are all so prissy.”

“Better prissy scientists than prick janitors--”

“ _Janitor?!_ ” Michael roars.

An arm, attached to a man with a shaved head and a worried expression, darts out and drags Free through the door. “Time to go, buddy. Don’t pick fights with the locals.”

“I wasn’t, Jeremy-- he was being an utter prat, Jeremy--”

Michael grits his teeth, and gets back to work. Maybe he can set off the siren at inconvenient moments, once he gets it working.

 

* * *

 

The situation gets worse, in all kinds of ways. A Category Two Kaiju they’ve given some sort of shitty abbreviation name bites a hole in the Portuguese Institution, and all of a sudden, more of the brightest minds on the planet are gone. Hopefully nothing hits Austin.

Michael also gets permanently assigned to Lab Three.

“You’re joking. Right?” he says to Trevor. “I can’t stay in there. That British fuck is gonna drive me to homicide.”

Trevor only shrugs. “Sorry, Michael, but you’re the best guy we’ve got and there’s a _lot_ of equipment in there that needs maintenance. You don’t have to stay in there all the time, and you can pick up D-rank assignments during your downtime, but if they need something--”

“Yeah, yeah. They say jump, and I say ‘fuck off’ but do it anyway. _Great_. Thanks a billion, man.”

Trevor looks like he didn’t wanna do it. It doesn’t make a difference to Michael in the slightest. He storms through the corridors of the Institute, acutely aware that this is all he’s got and all he’ll ever be, if the world gets any worse. A toolbox and a belt and an unending torrent of rage. They’re weapons and they’re motivation. World-fucking-famous Gavin Free shouldn’t make a difference at all.

Fix the electrics, fix the world. (Maybe.)

Lab Three are having a problem with one of their mass spec units, so Michael’s immediately down there to check on it. Though he likes fiddling with wires and whatnot, sometimes being elbow deep in the corrugated walls gets boring. He likes having to be careful because the machinery is delicate, rather than because it could kill him in half a second, so sue him.

“AYYYOOO,” calls Free, as soon as he enters the room. It’s that same stupid call he does when he’s celebrating with Dooley. “Mass spec repair is here!”

“You sure it’s not user error?” Michael asks.

“You sure you can handle Massy Speckle?” Free replies. Oh, god, he’s named it.

“I’m a _pro_ at handling mass, don’t you worry.”

Jeremy makes a pleased noise from behind a rack of luminous test tubes. He’s wearing goggles that have a huge green splat on the side. “Our mechanic’s got a hell of a mouth on him, Gav.”

“I’m an electrician,” he corrects. “I’m just really good at everything else, too. Where’s your mass--”

“Massy Speckle? She’s over there,” Jeremy says. He jabs a finger at the second row of benches. Jesus Christ, even the sensible-seeming one was encouraging this nonsense. “Can’t figure out what’s wrong with her - and Gav’s working on some equations right now, so he hasn’t got the time.”

“I’ll fix it,” Michael says firmly, with the hidden implication that Free might not have the capacity to do so, even if he had the opportunity.

It turns out to be a blown fuse in the bottom compartment. It’s a quick job, so whilst he’s there, Michael tapes down the wires that trail across the lab floor.

“Hey, thanks Michael! You didn’t have to do that.”

“Just making sure you don’t trip and die,” he shrugs. “See you later, Jeremy.”

He doesn’t say goodbye to Free as he leaves. He’s half expecting a glare when he passes, but all the man offers is the smuggest expression Michael’s ever seen.

He wants to punch it, and then maybe ask what kind of problem that level of math requires. Those equations had looked _hardcore_.

 

* * *

 

Michael learns, whilst he’s in the Austin Institute. He learns that Alfredo can patch a Jaeger body into the mainframe in nineteen minutes without half of what he should need; he learns from Trevor which member of staff is the best at cutting hair, because they both get irritated when it gets too long. The air con in his bunk isn’t broken, it’s on an Institute-wide timer to save power. Jeremy’s from Massachusetts and liked Spyro as a kid - Michael’s from New Jersey, and was always more of a Crash Bandicoot kind of guy.

The only new info he gets about Free is that for someone who doesn’t like swearing, he’s got a huge stash of imaginative insults in that wayward brain of his.

“Can you--” Michael says, and then his nose starts to sting. “Can you fuckin’ _not_ put guts on my workbench?! If you want me to keep fixing the shit you keep breaking, I’m gonna need a guaranteed _absence_ of Godzilla’s goddamn liver leaking over my space--”

“It’s the heart,” says Free. He waves it around a bit, cupped latex-clad hands the only thing that keeps the blue flesh from toppling to the floor, but eventually complies.

“Yeah? Well, it’s fuckin’ April. Shove your Valentine’s up your ass, Free.”

“Michael. I’m _hurt_ , Michael.”

To his horror, Michael has to fight back the beginnings of a smile. Free’s expression is stricken; he’s got a hand almost touching his chest, and it would be, if it wasn’t covered in toxic blood right now.

“Good. I hope you keel over from heartbreak.”

The distraction of having to hide his amusement catches up with him - Michael’s elbow brushes a loose wire in the heavy-duty light box he’s constructing, and he jerks with the slight _zap_ that goes up his funny bone.

Free snorts. “Fry, bitch.”

Michael keeps silent - he can’t think of anything to say, and there’s a pit of terror opening up in his stomach. He takes so much pride in his work that he finishes his project in half the estimated time, after that, and still can’t quite believe that Gavin Free distracted him from something he loves so much.

 

* * *

 

“He’s an asshole.”

“He’s not that bad,” Ryan says, and frowns from behind his glasses. Without his computer screen to squint at, he’s having to work through his code on paper.

“You’re just saying that ‘cos you’re popping the biggest boner for the lab rat.”

Ryan doesn’t deny it, and goes spectacularly red.

“Anyway,” Michael continues, popping his head up from underneath the desk, “it’s to the point where I’ve had to put a yard radius around my workspace. I’d rather be in here working with you guys, and that’s saying something--”

“You _do_ hate the coding team,” he admits.

“It’s not proper math, Ryan! Hell, it’s not math at all, it’s a language.”

“And god knows your language is bad enough.”

“I’ve seen you in those beer pong matches the Jaeger pilots get into,” Michael says, jabbing with a pair of cable cutters despite the fact that he’s retreated under the desk again. “For someone who doesn’t drink, you still have _totally_ shitty aim.”

Ryan _hmmph_ s, and crosses out something with probably a little too much force.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes, between the bickering, they have moments that are almost friendly. Michael is begrudgingly fixing some more shit in the computer lab, because the other coders somehow blew all the fuses for this section of the Institute, for fuck’s sake, and _who the hell gets wires in this much of a tangle Jesus Christ_.

“It’s like a cat’s cradle,” says Free, absently twirling a pen between his fingers. Yeah, he’s here too. He doesn’t have to run figures often, apparently, but this must be one of those rare times.

“A fuckin’ mess, is what it is,” Michael mutters.

He works in silence for a second. It’s a shame he left his knee pads in his bunk, but he really can’t be bothered to go and fetch them.

He’s tempted to walk all that way, though. Free’s incessant typing and tapping has been replaced by hair ruffling and grumbling.

“Arg--r _arh_!” he says eloquently. Looks like he finally snapped. “Smegging… _Paaaaap_.”

“Y’know, Free,” Michael says, standing up - that’s a _satisfying_ click in his knees, dear lord - “for someone from the motherland, you have a shit grasp of the English language.”

“Looks like I can’t sodding _code_ , either!” he says exasperatedly. “What the hell is this ‘parameter’ crap?!”

Michael dusts off his overalls, and wanders over to the desk Free’s working at, tossing an allen key onto the top. After a few seconds of peering at the garbled mess from over the man’s shoulder, he injects a few line breaks and some symbols, punches at the enter key, and waits for the display to tell him that it’s calculating.

Free gapes at him.

“What?”

“How the bloody hell did you do that?” he asks.

“I’m friends with Ryan,” Michael says, snatching his allen key up again. “I’m not great, but you pick up a few things.”

“That was genius,” he says. If stars could stick in people’s eyes, they’d be in his awestruck stare. “ _Michael_. Thank you.”

“...Shut the fuck up, Gavin.”

He turns away, embarrassed; Gavin’s flushing all the way to the tip of his beak-like fuckin’ nose with happiness, like he’s made some dumbass breakthrough. Ryan, from across the room, shoots them a strange look.

Michael’s about to shoot one back - you shut the fuck up and all, he wants to convey - but a welcome distraction beats him to it. Jeremy wanders into the computer lab holding a flash drive.

“Hey, uh… Ryan. I got those theoretical calculations for the breach. Are you the guy to give them to?”

“Yup,” says Ryan, as though he’s trying to mask the fact that he’s in pain. When Jeremy reaches his desk and hands it over, their fingers brush; Jeremy grins awkwardly. Ryan goes scarlet and looks at the lab assistant like he’s made of solid goddamn gold.

Michael tries to imitate the exact look he’d received not a minute ago, if not more judgemental, as Jeremy smiles and backs out of the room.

Ryan flips the bird at him, and Michael fucking _cackles_.

 

* * *

 

“What kind of science?” he asks, on a totally normal day. They haven’t had any attacks recently. It’s both a relief and a disgusting cocktail of anticipation and anxiety.

“Hm?”

“You keep saying you’re a scientist,” Michael points out. “What kind? Astronomy? Chemistry?”

Gavin looks up from the sample he’s prodding pins into, and chews the inside of his lip thoughtfully.

“Actually,” he says, “I consider myself a student of all sciences.”

“Right. That makes sense.” He doesn’t know why he expected a straight answer from the annoying dumbass, but he was kinda hoping anyways.

“It’s K-Science, love,” Gavin beams. “Biology of the beast. Chemistry of the biology. Physics of how they scarper through that wormhole in the sea. Astro-wotsits of where they come from--”

“I get it,” Michael huffs, “you’re crazy clever. No need to show off, Einstein.”

“Ay, you asked! I’m not showing off, I’m just showing.”

Michael realises they’re both smiling at each other. Almost like friends. He takes in Gavin - the dishevelled hair, the way his arms form perfect right angles when he puts his hands on his hips, even the pin about to stab him in his crotch - and lets the corners of his mouth twitch upwards.

“Where does geology come in, then?”

“Leave off, Michael.”

“No, seriously. Psychology? Agricultural engineering? I’m fuckin’ intrigued.”

“Michael,” Gavin wheezes pathetically, and puts his hands on his knees to curb his laughter.

 

* * *

 

It’s the beginning of July when the really explosive one happens. Gavin’s been on edge for weeks, and he’s utterly convinced that the next attack is gonna hit Australia, despite the fact that there hasn’t been any activity over in that part of the world yet. And if that’s the case? Well, Michael would hate to distract him from his work, annoyance or not.

So he rolls up his sleeves, and keeps maintaining the K-Science labs’ equipment.

The telltale signs of Gavin’s frustration are beginning to show. Whatever concoction he’s brewing, he’s too impatient to see it through to the end. When it topples over, immediately burning a hole in the worktop and shrivelling up the organ sample he’s working on, he lets out a loud iteration of: “ _SHIT!_ ”

“...Everything okay?” he ventures.

“No, it’s not bloody okay!” Gavin says, his voice breaking slightly. He throws angry hands and fingers in the direction of his project: “I don’t know why the Kaiju are acting like that-- I don’t know what they’re _guarding_. I need something better, but no-one’s letting me have it. I can’t survive on bloody… bladders and bits all the time! I need _more_.”

“Well,” says Michael uncomfortably, “maybe Trevor could--”

“Trevor’s not letting me have _anything_.”

“I’m sure he’s got his reasons.”

“They’re useless reasons,” says Gavin, with an air of finality, “and we’re all gonna die. He put you in here with me when it’s _obvious_ you hate me, I don’t trust anything he does--”

“...I don’t hate you,” says Michael quietly.

Gavin doesn’t hear him. He’s finally turned around, and his face is ashen.

“What are they?” he whispers.

Michael realises he’s spotted the artwork lining his forearms. “They’re tattoos,” he says, and goes to roll down his sleeves again, “sorry if you’re tattoo squeamish, although you of all people should--”

“No,” says Gavin. He grabs Michael’s arm with surprising force, and turns it over. “I said, _what are they._ ”

He gives up. “That one’s Cindercrest,” he says, pointing to the inside of his left arm. “She came up through the Raritan River and crushed pretty much everything in her path. And the other one? That’s Grievance. She was a Category Two, and she attacked from the Adriatic Sea--”

“I know what she did,” Gavin says coldly.

Michael scowls, and tears himself from Gavin’s grip. “What’s your problem?”

“My problem?!” Gavin says, in total disbelief, “my problem is that you have the damn nerve to criticise my sense of humour, and then you pull a stunt like this. _That’s_ my problem.”

“I’ve had these for three years, Gavin, what’s it to you?!”

“It’s four thousand, seven hundred and sixteen casualties in Italy to me,” he spits. “I actually thought you were-- I thought--”

“You do a lot of thinking, Gavin,” Michael says, feeling sour. “One of these days, you should stop making assumptions about, y’know, _real people_. Or it is easier for you if you have theoretical friends?”

Gavin backs away. If the worktop hadn’t still been gently sizzling in the background, then they could’ve heard a pin drop. “I thought I was understanding you,” he says, “I thought I was finally getting to know you. And you turn out to be, what, some kind of… Some kind of _Kaiju groupie_?!”

His fuse fizzles out. “You don’t know me!” Michael says viciously, “you don’t know anything about me! You can take your _understanding_ and you can wedge it down your dickhole--”

“Oh, pack it in, you _arse_ ,” Gavin screeches. He sounds dangerously close to tears. “You’re such a _wanker_.”

“You insufferable _fuck_.”

“You _piss pot_ , Michael.”

That’s enough of that. Michael folds up his wrench roll and stamps out of Lab Three altogether, feeling Gavin’s stare searing through the back of his head like a laser.

“Where are you going?”

“Anywhere away from you!” he calls over his shoulder, all fucks to be given scattered in his wake. “Might apply for a permanent transfer. Maybe I’ll get inked later on, who knows?”

“Yeah?” Gavin splutters. “Well at least I don’t worship the bloody things that are _killing us_ \--”

Michael spins on his heel, intent on delivering one last dig before he leaves: “no,” he says, “I don’t worship them. Some of us know what we’re fighting because of, Free. You just dance around your lab like a fucking child, as if the whole goddamn world is a playground instead of a _disaster zone_.”

He slams the door behind him. (He isn’t sorry in the slightest.)

 

* * *

 

“He really is sorry.”

“Jeremy,” Michael says seriously, “no offence, man, but it means jack shit, comin’ from you.”

“I know,” Jeremy whines. “I just saw you as I was passing through and… I don’t know, I thought I should say something.”

Michael’s been hanging out in the computer lab a lot more in the last week or so. Matt Bragg’s getting sick of him asking for assignments, but he’s learning a lot more about coding from Ryan, so he figures it’s a win-win situation.

And if he’s been wearing long sleeved shirts since his argument with Gavin, well… No-one seems to have picked up on it, anyway.

He narrows his eyes. Jeremy looks shifty. “Does Gavin know you’re telling me this?” he asks, letting suspicion tinge his tone.

“Uh… No. But listen,” Jeremy says quickly, “he’s been super out-of-sorts ever since whatever happened happened. He’s stopped singing altogether. Hell, he’s not even playing his music out of those shitty USB speakers anymore. For fuck’s sake, you gotta snap him out of it.”

 _I don’t have to do anything_ , Michael wants to say. Instead, he sighs for several seconds, and settles on: “I’ll think about it.”

Jeremy lets out a tiny _yay!_ that doesn’t fit his image whatsoever, and makes for the door.

There’s a cough from a few desks over.

“Uh… Jeremy?”

“Oh, hey, Ryan. What’s up?”

Michael returns to the unit he’s wiring in, and discreetly eavesdrops. Jeremy’s started leaning on the edge of Ryan’s desk, and Ryan is still focusing his trademark, starstruck gaze on him. _Idiots_.

“I have, um, Gavin’s calculations. They just came through.”

“Aw, sweet, I’ll drop them in to him on my way back. What else have you been working on?”

Ryan blinks. “...Jaeger coding.”

“Really?! That’s fucking _awesome_! I mean, I know that’s what you do anyway, but it’s still cool. What part?”

“We’re calibrating the cannon on Gatling Beta right now,” Ryan says. He tilts the screen towards Jeremy, who leans forwards a little more to get a better view. “If it doesn’t sync up with the drift cycle...”

Jeremy nods grimly. “Then no kaboom. Got it. Man, that’s awesome. You’re the real hero here, Ry.”

Ryan goes absolutely fucking _scarlet_ , and runs a shaking hand through his flyaway hair. “Oh, I don’t know about that. I’m not fighting those things out there--”

“You’re the whole reason Jaeger pilots can do it in the first place,” Jeremy says earnestly.

There’s a pause. Michael takes that moment to clear his throat, loudly, and out of the corner of his eye, he can see them both jump. Jeremy leaps from his perch on the desk as though he’s been burnt.

“Well, uh--”

“--yeah, see you, Jeremy.”

“--Totally, I’m gonna, um. Take these...” He picks up the stack of files and the flash drives Ryan had given him. “Take these back to Gav. See ya later, pal.”

Michael shakes his head, and starts to assemble the shell of the computer unit he’s working on. Idiots. Idiots dancing around each other.

It’s the next day when he gets a request through for Lab Three. The mass spec is playing up again. It’ll be a quick, simple task, so he heads over first thing in the morning.

When he enters, he brushes straight past Gavin, placing his toolbox on the workbench and cracking open the casing of the mass spectrometer.

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” Gavin says, his voice suddenly drifting through the air from over his shoulder.

Michael is pierced with a stab of annoyance. “The fuck didja call me out, then?”

“To say sorry.”

Okay, he kind of wasn’t expecting that at all, and the blunt honesty leaves him scrambling for words for a second. “Why?” is what he eventually conjures up. What a fucking moron he is.

“Because,” Gavin says, wringing his hands - there’s a smudge of Kaiju blood on his sleeve, Michael notices - “because I was really nasty to you, and you didn’t know about Italy, so I’m sorry. You get tattooed with whatever you want. I was being nosy and assuming, when you’re entitled to have your own reasons for your tattoos. So… Sorry.”

Michael glances to the left, frowning, and after some deliberation, sticks his hand out.

“Sorry too, Gav. I should’ve warned you about the tats. They’re a sensitive subject, yeah?”

When they shake hands, Gavin looks like he could faint with relief. “Everything’s a sensitive subject when we’re all living it,” he says, “if you can put up with my being a pleb, then I can look at a bloody stupid Kaiju face on your arm. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” says Michael.

He thinks maybe that both of them feel better after that.

 

* * *

 

 

A lot of the time, he doesn’t know the date. Michael works almost every day, and sometimes they all blur into one long shift with a nap in the middle.

Today, it’s July 24th.

After working every day for two solid weeks, he’s been given two days off by Trevor, and instructed - forcefully, mind you - to _take a fuckin’ vacation. Get drunk with Juliet Arson’s pilots, Barbara and Lindsay would be happy to. Hell, jerk off for forty-eight hours, I don’t care._

He heads to Lab Three.

This should be enough to cheer both residents of the room up, he suspects. Happy scientists are productive scientists, right? He’d overheard Trevor yelling at Gavin earlier that week, so it would probably be welcome. Something about black market Kaiju organ parts… Although to be honest, it’s a good market, because the black market dealers are the only ones reckless enough to get to a Kaiju carcass first.

Michael really hopes this works.

When Gavin turns up later - wait, where the hell did he get a soda? Michael wants take out real bad now.

Still, Gavin turns up, and sucks on the straw thoughtfully, and says, “maintenance?”

“Hm?”

“Maintenance,” he says, with more certainty this time. “I didn’t put in a request. I don’t think Jeremy did, either. So it must be a site-wide thing.”

“Think again, Gavvers,” Michael grins, and closes the wall panel he’s just finished up. It snaps shut with some satisfying metallic crunches. “I had to wire it in so the siren would override it, obviously, but it should work with a normal headphone jack...”

Gavin looks suitably bemused. “Michael,” he says slowly. “What have you done?”

He answers by tossing a tiny remote control at the man, who fumbles it.

“See you in a couple days,” he grins, “this can keep you company ‘til then!”

As he lets the lab door slide shut behind him, he guesses that Gavin has experimentally pressed the play button. Some godawful pop starts blaring mid-song throughout the room, reverberating even in the corridor as he leaves.

The squawks of delight are totally worth the hours he spent wiring in the speakers.

 

* * *

 

Something’s wrong. The alarm isn’t sounding, so it can’t be Gavin’s predicted Kaiju event yet - although he has narrowed that down to this week, which is horrifying - so it must be something else.

His paranoia is confirmed shortly. The vibes in the air had been all wrong. Michael’s speed-walking down the corridor towards the labs, convinced that something’s amiss in the Institute somewhere, when Jeremy bursts out of the sliding doors looking like he’s about to shit his pants.

“Oh, thank fuck, Michael,” he wheezes, “I gotta get Trevor, that _asshole_ \--”

“Woah, slow down,” says Michael, fear prickling at the back of his neck. “What the hell did Trevor do?”

“Not Trevor,” Jeremy clarifies. His eyes dart back into the lab. “ _Gavin_. I gotta go get Trevor.”

Michael jumps into action; he hurtles through the doorway around Jeremy, who sprints down the corridor towards the main hub of the Institute.

In the lab are a number of things: a huge lump of flesh, in a bubbling blue tank. A horrendous mess of wires and cords. Gavin Free, connected via the second to the first. He’s in a crumpled heap on the floor.

He almost slips and falls, scrambling to get to him, but somehow Michael pulls him into a sitting position. He props him up against the tank - Jeremy must have ripped the drift headset off him when he found this mess earlier - and notes with horror that Gavin’s nose is leaking a steady stream of red onto his otherwise immaculate lab coat.

“Gavin-- Gavin, you fuck, can you hear me?”

A limb jerks, like a hundred volts just ran through it. Possibly a yes.

“What the fuck have you _done_ , you moron?!”

The desperation courses through his bloodstream like acid. There must be Kaiju blood bubbling in his lungs. He’s never felt like this before. And the cool relief as it drains away, when Gavin opens bloodshot eyes and grabs at the collar of Michael’s overalls… Well, it’s beyond comparison.

“I can’t fucking _believe_ you! You make a neural link out of garbage and scrap metal and drift with pieces of Kaiju trash?! What were you thinking?!”

“I told Trevor it would work,” Gavin says, through grinding teeth. His eyes are unfocused. He’s shaking, like he’s shivering, except his skin is scalding to the touch.

Michael hauls him up and throws him into an office chair, grabbing his face to ground him. Gavin’s trembling hands clutch so tightly at the leather arms that they’ll probably leave an impression. “For one of the brightest minds in this whole building, you’re real fuckin’ stupid,” Michael spits. “I could’ve-- We could’ve lost you forever. There’s no undoing that.”

“Aw, you care,” Gavin says weakly.

The iris of his left eye is shot to shit. Instead of those gentle blues and greens, the colours have been torn into angry, soaking reds.

“I’m getting you some water. Stay here,” Michael barks.

As he’s filling the glass from the lab sink, he tries not to think about how his hands are shaking just as much as Gavin’s are, if not more. Is it from sheer rage? Fear?

He doesn’t want to know.

 

* * *

 

“You can’t be serious.”

“I’m deadly damn serious, Michael, my boi,” Gavin had said. “He wants me to do it again.”

“No way. You’re gonna kick it. Without a doubt. Have you even considered that a drift is two way? Didn’t you say it was a hive mind?”

“Look, Michael. My calculations - they’re tippy toppers, now. We’ve evacuated most of Hong Kong, we know where and when it’s gonna appear within _miles and hours._ It’s gonna be my only chance to drift with a fresh brain--”

“You’re gonna fucking _die_ , Gavin,” Michael had replied. “Doesn’t that bother you?”

And Gavin hadn’t said anything at all. He’d just wiped his bloody nose on his sleeve and started grabbing his things.

 

* * *

 

So Michael’s in China.

(Or Hong Kong, at least. He’s always been a bit fuzzy on the geographical politics, there.)

He’s resigned himself, now, to the fact that he might have to follow Gavin Free across the globe for many times to come. Assuming that they both survive this, of course. He’s only a couple of hours behind, because priority travel to Hong Kong had been ranked _Gavin, Jaegers, Michael_ , but Trevor’s pulled strings enough that he’s a little further ahead than any other techs.

Gavin’s calculations mean that if either of them survive - if any of the entire Institute survive - they’ll have to be back in Austin within the day. No time to rest; there’s an event straight afterwards with the potential to be fuck-off enormously catastrophic, directly across from Houston.

So that’s gonna be fun.

He arrives after the battle. His helicopter is at a height where Michael can survey the damage from a decent distance. Fallen skyscrapers. Jaegers, standing knee-deep in the water like toddlers on their first beach trip. Great stinking dents in the concrete coastline. Kaiju blood leaking into the sea, and a gigantic body draped across the bay.

He points the pilot as close to that last one as possible. If Gavin’s anywhere, he’ll be there.

It takes him twenty minutes to get anywhere near the Kaiju - there’s black market vultures already butchering it, but Gavin or Trevor must have set up a deal so the brain was intact. As Michael approaches, he can already see the tower of metal that might strike up a link between them, and…

“What the fuck happened here?”

“There was a baby,” says Gavin shakily, barely turning to look at Michael. He’s on top of its head, pushing huge electrodes through its skull. “I was fine for a while, I was in a bunker, but you were right, it’s a two way link and I’m a pillock. Never mind. I’ve got about five minutes until brain death, if you wanna give me a hand or sommat then that would be _excellent_ \--”

Michael’s armpit deep in crocodile clips and insulated wires before Gavin can finish. “Was it scary?” he asks. “Did you piss yourself?”

“I didn’t piss myself, no.”

“You look like shit anyway, dude. You’re soaked. In rain _and_ Kaiju goo. Ew.”

“Michael,” Gavin says seriously. His lab coat is missing an entire sleeve. “Kindly put a sock in it. I’ve got to figure out why the Kaiju are acting like they’re acting.”

“Then let me help.”

“You’re doing a _stellar_ job,” the scientist says bitterly, and then finally turns around to look at him.

Michael’s holding up the two drift headsets, from the basic unit Gavin’s sliced up and stitched together again. “Let me help you,” he repeats, “I can share the neural load. That’s what the Jaeger pilots do, right?”

Gavin looks like he could cry. “You’d do that for me?” he asks, bouncing on his heels. “You’d do that? _With_ me?”

He blinks. He hadn’t even given it a second thought.

“‘Course I would.”

“Michael,” Gavin says weakly, as though his name says everything he wants it to convey.

Whatever. They set up the drift; he’ll find out soon enough. That shared memory function is a real pain in the ass, Michael’s heard.

“Ready?”

He stares at this scientist - this total madman of a hundred specialised fields, not specialised out of some sort of superiority, but out of enthusiasm and necessity, out of survival - and puts his hand over Gavin’s on the drift trigger.

“Let’s rock this motherfucker,” he says gravely. Gavin giggles, slightly hysterically, and they jam the button down together.

 

* * *

 

_Michael’s four years old, and he sticks a fork in the power outlet. He gets a nasty zap, but luckily the rubber handle protects him from most of it._

_Gavin’s ten. He wears nail varnish on his toes, so that no-one sees it and makes fun of him._

 

_Michael’s seventeen. His best friend joins the army, and never comes back._

_Gavin’s sixteen. His best friend comes back, but he’s a garbled mess of nightmares and animalistic lashing-out, like a frightened wolf caught in a trap._

 

_When he turns twenty five, Michael gets his first tattoo. It’s to remind him that he’s got a job to do._

_Gavin’s twenty two. The family on his mother’s side scatter when Grievance descends on northeastern Italy, and he doesn’t hear from over half of them ever again. No-one seems to know if they made it out alive or not._

 

* * *

 

There’s something in the darkness, shining in blue and silver, and it’s dangerous. Thousands, millions of beings, an infinite number of cells all thinking the same thing--

The breach--

The pilots--

open--

 

* * *

 

_Michael’s thirty, and he spends his birthday putting up speakers in Gavin’s lab._

_Gavin’s boyfriend when he’s nineteen punches him in the face, and walks out of his life forever. Drifting with a Kaiju isn’t the first time he’s burst blood vessels in his eye, but it’s the first time someone else cares about the damage._

_Michael’s twenty four. His first serious girlfriend gets swept away when Cindercrest breathes toxic waste over his hometown, and he’s never hated himself for taking a vacation as much as he does then._

_Gavin’s twenty nine. Michael’s arse looks great in those overalls, but it’d look better in jeans. He wonders if he’ll ever get to see Michael in civvies._

 

* * *

 

Michael lurches out of the drift, unclipping the headset, and feels warm blood drip down his face.

“You alright?” yells Gavin.

“I got-- I got tasered, once,” Michael says. His mouth is dry.

“That bad?”

“Oh, no,” he says, wiping sweat from his brow, “no, this is _way_ worse,” and then he has to stop talking because he’s spewing his guts up everywhere.

“It’s not gonna work, is it?” Gavin asks. When Michael’s stomach has stopped clenching painfully, he tries to straighten out to make eye contact, and notices that the residual energy is making Gavin’s eyebrows go haywire. Twitching all over the place.

He’d laugh, but he coughs, instead. “It’s not gonna work,” he confirms. “We gotta tell the others.”

 

* * *

 

The new plan is essentially, in Gavin’s words, to stick a nuke in a Kaiju, instead of directly in the Breach. Trevor’s surprisingly well prepared for that angle. The Jaegers are already descending, ready to fool the portal into letting them through, and some are even staying behind to defend Houston. It restores Michael’s faith in humanity, just a little bit.

It’s a good job they didn’t build that stupid dumbass wall.

So they head back to the Austin Institute, intent on offering repairs and drift code and calculations and information wherever they can. Gavin asks him on the way if he’d ever thought about becoming a Jaeger pilot, and Michael tells him with a weary grin that he’d got a problem with apologising that’d always stood in the way, and that’s pretty much all they say to each other until they’re back on solid ground. Their jet is a ten hour journey, which is better than commercial flights. Louder, but that doesn’t matter. Michael’s so tired that he passes out anyway, until he has to force himself to his feet again. They sprint through the Institute, waiting for the Earth’s fate to be decided, and they’re too tired to be terrified.

Michael, at one point, thinks about shaving and tidying up his beard, when this is all over. He only remembers that he shaves every morning and doesn’t even _have_ a beard when he brings his hand up to his bare face.

Juliet Arson cons her way into the Breach, with Barbara and Lindsay clinging to a Category Five Kaiju for dear life. Michael catches Gavin scratching absently at scales he doesn’t have. When the other man realises what he’s doing, he seems surprised to find hands at the end of his arms, rather than claws.

They lose a Jaeger. They lose another. They don’t lose Lindsay or Barbara; the two float safely to the surface of the ocean, ready to be rescued. The Kaiju get nuked, and the explosion seals the Breach. Michael winces, as some sort of residual connection alerts him to the burning heat of a million, identical organisms being reduced to atoms and light.

Ryan slaps him on the back, shocking him into the cheering central hub of the Institute.

“We did it,” he grins, “ _you did it_!”

Holy shit.

They did it.

“Gavin,” he says, feeling stuck, “Gavin, we--”

And when he reaches out to touch Gavin’s sleeve, the one that’s still there, Gavin spins on one foot and falls into him.

“Hey, _hey_ ,” he says, instead of _we did it_. “I got you. We’re all good. I gotcha.”

Gavin doesn’t say anything. They’re a jumbled mess of mixed memories and possibly one person. He presses cold, unsteady fingertips to Michael’s face, his cheek, his temple, and Michael’s not sure where either of them begin or end anymore.

Someone’s popping champagne, somewhere. It feels distant. The cheering and yelling is barely making its way into Michael’s brain anymore. Jeremy glides by with enough moonshine to fill an aquarium, and promptly fobs it off onto Matt Bragg when he spots Ryan. In two short strides, he’s dragging the technician down for a hard, victorious kiss.

Ryan responds with gusto.

As much as Michael loves a good party - and this is the best excuse for a party _ever_ \- he kind of just wants to hide in a quiet room until his head stops flickering on the inside.

When Gavin grabs his hand, he follows. And when they fall into his bunk - closer than Michael’s room, who knew - they can’t even take off their shoes before they collapse with exhaustion.

 

* * *

 

Something stirs.

Someone?

Who knows.

He might be a mother Kaiju now. He’s never dreamt about being pregnant before.

Then again, he’s never dreamt in quadratic equations before, or an array of theoretical physics either, so there’s a first time for everything.

Michael rolls over, and Gavin’s there. He’s breathing. This is the best he could have hoped for.

Gavin cracks open his eyes, and opens his mouth immediately. “Do you think the drift set a neural alarm clock for us, so that we’d wake up at the same time?” he croaks.

Michael huffs out a laugh. It hurts his ribs, a lot. “You’re a goddamn idiot.”

“Ey, none of that, now,” he says, wagging a lazy finger at him. “Just for that little jab, I’m getting in the shower first.”

“Fine by me,” Michael says. Gavin climbs over him, and he’s out like a light all over again. After fifteen minutes, or maybe fifteen years - god, his sense of time is all over the place - Gavin shakes him awake again.

“Shower’s free,” he grins. He’s fully dressed. “You’ve got bog roll stuffed in your nose, did you know?”

“How do you have this much energy?” Michael gripes. He pulls himself out of bed anyway. “Nothing in here is gonna fit me. Probably not even your towels.”

“Wouldn’t mind that, I’ll be honest.”

Michael ignores the fervent eyebrow waggling. “I’m heading back to mine. Be outside in twenty, okay?”

“For what, Michaelboi?”

He lets his eyes flicker over Gavin’s face. His beard’s been tidied up. “We just saved the goddamn world,” he says, reasonably, “so we deserve a nice breakfast. Let’s go out for breakfast.”

And Gavin only grins at that, so Michael practically jogs back to his bunk to rinse the last two days off his skin. He notes in the mirror that his right eye is all burst and gammy - did he say ‘gammy’ before? Was that Gavin, sticking around in his brain? - and that it probably matches.

A pair. A set, of pupils. Figures.

There’s a banging on his door, just as he’s pulling on jeans and using body spray for the first time in forever. Gavin’s there to look at his legs appreciatively when he yanks it open.

“Knew you’d look good in a pair of Levis.”

“I know,” Michael reminds him. “Saw it in the drift. Let’s go already, dumbass.”

They pick the best greasy spoon in all of Austin, because service workers are scary organised, and nothing stops people from going out for food. Michael knows, because he worked for Dominos during hurricane season one time, and people still expected them to carry out deliveries. Gavin prattles incessantly about miniscule details that don’t even matter, and Michael listens.

“Was it me that took piano lessons, or you?”

“That was you. I was always shitty at that kind of thing.”

“Ah, okiedokie, then. I still reckon you would’ve been a top Jaeger pilot, though.”

“I’ve already told you,” Michael says, as the waitress sets plates down on their booth table, “I don’t play well with others.”

Despite his victorious cry of _brekkers!_ , and the observation that the waitress somehow looks even wearier than the two men she was serving, Gavin’s mind still flits back and forth like a fucking hummingbird.

“You set up my speakers for me,” he says, chewing on a forkful of fries.

Michael pops the yolk of his egg. “Yup.”

“ _On your birthday_.”

“I wanted to. Shut the fuck up.”

“Now I’m double sorry about what I said. About your tattoos.”

Michael catches a flicker of something lingering. _His markings are beautiful. So detailed. On the Kaiju, I mean-- Shuddup, Jeremy, you knew what I meant--_

“I’m double sorry I said what I said, then, too,” he replies, and stabs at some bacon.

“You know what I found out this morning?”

“What?”

“They named the Kaiju we brought down,” Gavin smiles. “My one was Ragehunter, the one we drifted with. The other was Vicejaw.”

“Are Barb and Lindsay back yet?”

“Should be arriving this afternoon.”

They don’t talk about their drift, after that.

 

* * *

 

The Austin Institute is closing down, permanently. Hong Kong and Tokyo are turning into permanent observational stations, but the staff are scattering across the globe, and Michael guesses that he has to go, too.

Gavin’s gonna be fine. Apparently he’s got a whole load of academic talk gigs lined up. He’s a jammy motherfucker, but Michael thinks that kind of thing suits him very well.

He’s in Lab Three, disassembling Massy Speckle, when Jeremy approaches him.

“What you did,” he says, “that was certainly something.”

“Gavin started it,” Michael replies, like he’s telling tales on him.

“He’s stupid enough to start it. You were sensible enough to help him finish it. So thanks.”

Michael thinks about shaking Jeremy’s hand, or bringing him in for a hug, or asking if he’s headed back to Boston anytime soon. He wants to ask about the future, but something between his eyes flashes bright, and he kinda wants to clutch at the floor, instead.

“I couldn’t,” he says, choking suddenly, “I wasn’t gonna let him d--”

“Hey,” Jeremy says, and grabs his elbow. “It’s okay, buddy. You didn’t let him. You did a better job or it than me, too.”

He holds a stare to rival Michael’s best scowl. It’s unsettling.

“Have you two talked about--”

“ _No_ ,” Michael says, firmly. “It wouldn’t work out.”

“Whatever you say, pal.”

“Look, Jeremy. I’m happy for you, man, I _really_ am, I’m glad you got your fairytale fuckin’ ending with the man of your dreams. But Gavin can do a billion times better than me, c’mon.”

“Really?” Jeremy challenges. “You realise Gavin had swarms of doctors and astrophysicists and all sorts of shit throwing themselves at his feet, when we were in Europe? I wasn’t even anywhere near the best lab assistant there. Hell, I was basically a guinea pig for all sorts of drift bullshit. He chose me to come to Austin because we work well together, not because I nod and say _yes, Gavin_ and whatever.”

“Okay?” says Michael. He can’t really see where this is going.

“ _So_ ,” Jeremy continues, “that’s why you’re good for him too. You know? You fight him on his angle and you’ve done that since the first _second_ he stepped foot in this lab. Going back and forth with people gives him something to push back against. It makes him better. It keeps him in check. God, Michael, he _likes_ you, a lot.”

Michael rubs at a beard that isn’t there, and blinks away pain in an eye that’s decidedly ruined.

He ends up on Gavin’s doorstep, his work be damned.

“Michael? Does someone need me somewh--”

“Was it me who broke my arm going over my handlebars when I was eleven?” Michael asks, not giving Gavin a chance to finish, “or was it you?”

“That was you,” says Gavin. His eyes glance down at his wrist anyway, just in case.

“Was it you who got a little bit turned on when I called you smart? Or was it the other way around?”

“ _Definitely_ the other way around.”

(He quite enjoys the way that Gavin’s eyes rake up his torso, like he’s already undressing him at the mere mention of getting turned on.)

“Now, correct me if I’m wrong,” Michael continues, and Gavin, bless him, Gavin’s finally catching on, “because the drift’s left my memory a little fuzzy. Did I follow you around on all your college talks? Or did you invite me?”

“I invited you,” Gavin snorts.

Michael’s heart is fucking singing. (It’s possibly in an alien language, but he’ll take what he can get.)

Gavin leans forwards, balancing on his tiptoes. “Is it you who loves me?” he retaliates. “Or me who loves you?”

“Shut _up_ , Gavin.”

“Come on,” he laughs, “I wanna know.”

“You already know, dumbass.”

“You stubborn prick,” Gavin says, and pulls him inside.

“You fucking diva,” Michael says, and kisses Gavin’s bottom lip.

Gavin pulls him in by the waist and runs a hand up his back, slipping his tongue into Michael’s mouth like they’ve done this a hundred times. It’s weird, kissing someone when they’re feeling the kiss in your brain and you’re feeling it in theirs, but it’s pretty goddamn sweet to know they’re some of the only people in the world with that kind of connection.

“You know what?” says Michael, drawing back. Gavin’s lips are already slick.

“What?”

“I’m gonna close the door,” he smirks, and does it with one hand when Gavin starts backing him towards his bunk.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on [tumblr](http://futureboy-ao3.tumblr.com/)!


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